Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Government is very committed to continuing to improve, expand and develop our National Ambulance Service. We have increased the budget for the National Ambulance Service every year for four years running. That money goes towards several objectives. It goes towards pay restoration, pay increases, extra staff, new ambulances, improving our existing ambulance bases and introducing new technology ranging from Eircodes to onboard equipment. We have seen a big improvement in our ambulance services over recent years, particularly as staff have been upskilled and as we have more paramedics and advanced paramedics providing emergency healthcare the moment they arrive at the scene, thus providing emergency interventions immediately, long before the patient gets to the hospital and that is the way to go. There will be many more improvements in that regard into the future.

What the Deputy refers to is of course an industrial relations dispute. It is principally an inter-union dispute. There are a number of unions which represent the majority of ambulance staff, paramedics and others which are already recognised. SIPTU is certainly the main union, Fórsa is the other union and there may be a third union and this is an inter-union dispute. We know from so many other workplaces that it is much better to have staff represented by one union or maybe two, rather than having six, seven or eight unions competing with each other as much as trying to negotiate better terms and conditions for their staff. We have seen that in so many other fields where disputes would have been resolved much quicker to the benefit of everyone had there been only one union or two, rather than six or seven competing with each other and taking members off each other rather than engaging in the work that they should be doing, which is advancing the interests of their members.

This is an industrial relations dispute. It will be resolved in the normal way and as is always the case with industrial relations disputes, there will not be interference from Ministers.

See this speech in context